


Strained

by AndyAO3



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, I bet it will have, Possible smut, Violence, actually who knows where it will go, broody elf angsting, my snarkyHawke is unpredictable like that, the broody elf has trouble making friends, where this fic is going
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-27
Updated: 2014-08-08
Packaged: 2018-02-10 14:28:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2028474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndyAO3/pseuds/AndyAO3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Travelling with Hawke can make prejudice hard to hold onto. And yet, at times it can make it just as hard to let go.</p><p>Fenris-centric scribbles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In the beginning, there was...

**Author's Note:**

> Wanted to try some Fenris. I need to get the hang of writing him, it's something I've never done before (pages upon pages of scribbled down notes while playing don't count, Andy). His head is an interesting thing to try and live in. He's very thoughtful, and intelligent.
> 
> First DA2 fic has now commenced!

"Do they hurt when you get healed?" Bethany asked out of the blue one day.

Fenris turned to look at her. She never lacked for questions. At first, she had been nervous around him in the same way that one might be nervous around an injured animal. Carefully circling around him, never getting too close, and yet always concerned, always _curious_. Soon enough, however, she had moved on to prodding him with questions.

Apt as the comparison was, Fenris bristled at the thought of being the injured animal in question.

"My scars," he stated. This was not the first time she had asked him about them. Although, it had taken a bit of time to get used to her tendency to start a conversation in the middle of one of her own trains of thought with no context whatsoever; after some time, he had determined it best to confirm what it was she was asking about before answering her question.

She smiled. He wondered, sometimes, at what sort of influence might make a sweet smile into someone's default expression of choice. "Mmhm."

"Yes." He felt no need to go into detail.

Bethany's smile faded, and a faint crease formed in her brow as she leaned against her staff. "Oh. I'm sorry." Were it any other mage, he would have been less than pleased with their pity. But since it was Bethany, her guilt over a thing she had no hand in bringing about made him slightly uneasy. "Don't suppose you can get rid of them, huh?"

Hawke had laughed in his face when he had called Bethany a viper in their midst, and he could see why. "I do not think so," he answered her.

"What those magisters did to you is rubbish," she said. "You shouldn't have to step on other people to move up in the world."

A slight unbidden smirk tugged at his lips. "Is that not what we are doing now?"

"Well, maybe. But most of the people we've done it to deserved it, and the rest attacked us first."

He merely looked at her. It didn't take her long at all to mentally review what she'd just said. He could tell she'd done it when she straightened up to pout at him, flushing slightly with embarassment.

"Just because we _are_ doing it doesn't make it less stupid," she said with a huff.

"Would you then call your brother a fool for being the one to lead us into it?"

At that, Bethany's smile returned. Sweet and mostly untouched by the world. She was no magister. "He _can_ be a thick git sometimes," she admitted.

Fenris could see why many in the group were protective of her. "Then it is good to know that such things do not seem to run in your family."

The girl burst into giggles at that for some reason. He wasn't sure quite why. But when it seemed she was about to elaborate, they were interrupted.

"Bethany! Fenris!" Hawke called out, a good distance ahead down the jagged coastline. Waving his arm to indicate where he was, as if it would be difficult to spot his tall, lanky frame otherwise. It wasn't. He was just making himself look foolish. "Come on, we've got work to do!"

Hawke's sister rolled her eyes and grinned. "Oh well. Best get going before he comes all the way back just to snark at us." She nodded respectfully to Fenris, and strode off after her brother to join him and Isabela down the path.

 _Bethany doesn't have an evil bone in her body,_ Hawke had told him, after he'd stopped laughing at Fenris declaring her a viper in their midst. _Not that she's not tough, but she's everyone's little sister._

Having a mage as a sister would be unbearable... unless she was like Bethany. That, he might be able to tolerate.

 


	2. Ring your song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bethany is not lumped into the same category as most other mages. Bethany is her own category, a category with a population of one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lemme know if you think I'm getting them OOC at all. OuO
> 
> This turned out way cuter than I thought it would. And you now know my custom Hawke's name.

Fenris didn't get many visitors to his mansion. Rarely, Hawke would come to see him, all charm and wit with that infectious smirk and disarming friendliness. Fenris would drink a bottle or two of the fine wine he'd found in the cellar, Hawke would smoke his pipe, and they would discuss things. On those occasions, Fenris found it easy to open up to the human, although the drink may have something to do with that.

That evening, he did not wish to speak to Hawke, however. He wished to drink, and sleep, and forget the day entirely if he could. He did not even want to _think_ about Hawke, because it would only serve to anger him.

He should have known. From the start, he should have _seen_.

There was a knock on the front door; it echoed through the halls inside, and the sound made Fenris's ears twitch. No. He would not go and answer. Hawke was the only one who visited at such an hour, and Fenris was not in a mood for polite conversation with him. Raising a bottle to his lips, Fenris stayed stubbornly in his spot by the fire.

The second knock rang more insistantly, more loudly through the halls than the first had. Fenris paused, frowning at the bottle in his hand. Odd. Usually Hawke would have gone away after having been ignored. Then whoever it was knocked a third time, and Fenris sighed wearily.

If Hawke was being this persistant, then ignoring him would just lead to a broken door. Fenris set the bottle down and got up with a stretch, before heading downstairs to answer the door.

When he opened it, it wasn't the Hawke he was thinking of who was on the other side of it.

Bethany startled when the door opened, looking as if she had been halfway to knocking again. "Blimey, Fenris, don't scare me like that," she said, relaxing when she saw that it was just him. "I was starting to think I might've come to the wrong door."

"Bethany." A statement of the obvious, but the fact that it was her and not her brother had admittedly thrown Fenris off a little bit. "You came alone," he added, glancing around for any that may have followed her. None had.

She looked over her shoulder as well, nervously. "Yeah, well, maybe not the _best_ idea I've had. I nearly got mugged."

He blinked. "Nearly," he repeated.

The young woman pouted at him. "I'm not a little _girl_ , Fenris."

Implying that she could take care of herself. Of course. "Indeed. My apologies."

The pout disappeared, replaced by a smirk that was so like her brother's, and yet so unlike it at the same time. "So are you going to invite me in or not?"

He nodded, and took a step back so that she could enter. Once she was inside, he closed the door behind her. A thousand thoughts raced through his mind, not the least of which being the question of why she'd even come.

Bethany set her staff down by the door, before turning to observe the entry-room. Her nose crinkled with distaste. "Still haven't cleaned this place up, have you?"

"I have not," he said, without shame. Although the way Bethany said it made it seem like he should feel bad for having not done so, and he frowned slightly. "It is not safe to walk the streets of Kirkwall alone after nightfall. You know this."

"Oh, I snuck out," she told him easily, with the same casual tone that she might use to announce that she had bread at breakfast. When she realized that Fenris was looking at her oddly, she grinned at him. "It's much easier to do when my brother's out of the house, of course."

"Then your brother is at the Hanged Man," he said, but Bethany shook her head.

"No, he's with that Warden bloke, Anders. Checking up on him or somesuch."

Fenris snarled. "The abomination."

"Mm," Bethany aknowledged, though it was hard to tell whether she agreed or not. "I sort of... wanted to talk to you about all of that, if it's all right."

That only made him angrier. "If you think that you will sway me with pretty words, _mage_ , then you are mistaken," he growled, narrowing his eyes. Of course he'd been right about her to begin with. She was just like the rest.

She seemed taken aback by that. "I... That wasn't what I was going to say at all, really. Erm. I'm... sorry?"

...Oh. "Then... I apologize. Continue."

Bethany blinked rapidly, tilting her head just a little. "Do you always _glow_ like that when you're angry about something?" she asked, indicating his tattoos by pointing.

Right. The lyrium. He exhaled slowly in an attempt to calm himself, and the light from the lyrium branded into his skin faded. "At times."

Her eyes widened, and she came forward to examine him a little more closely. He took a step back out of reflex. "Amazing," she breathed, reaching out.

He jerked back when her fingertips brushed against his skin, the lyrium flaring again. From several feet away he stared at her, instantly wary of her curiosity. He narrowed his eyes. "Don't."

"Oh, bollocks. I'm sorry!" Her hands came up in a gesture of surrender. "Sorry. Forgot about the no-touching thing for a second there. Jeb told me about that, I should've realized."

It took him a few seconds longer to quiet himself after that, but eventually he did. And when he did, it occurred to him that he was being a very poor host. He cleared his throat and straightened, looking her in the eye. "The fault is my own. Perhaps we should continue this upstairs?" If they were to speak of the abomination... _Anders_ , then Fenris would need more wine.

Bethany looked relieved. "You've got chairs upstairs, right? Been on my feet the the whole bloody day."

"I have chairs," he affirmed.

She sighed wearily. "Thank the Maker," she said, and walked right past him towards the prospect of being able to sit down in a proper chair.

\---

"You know, I think Jeb takes whole _mage rights_ thing more seriously than I do," Bethany remarked, sitting backwards in the chair she'd claimed for herself with her legs stuck out on either side of the back of it. An unusual pose, but at least she was not putting her feet up on whatever other surface was nearby and filling the room with pipe-smoke. "Or just rights in general, really. Elf rights, too."

Fenris snorted. "Neither of which seems to have it as badly in Kirkwall as he may think."

They were in his bedroom, as it had been the room that was the least horribly ravaged and blood-splattered. Bethany did not seem to care about the implications as a magister might have, saying something about how sharing a room with her two brothers had long since rid her of any sense of impropriety.

It made sense enough. If Hawke bedded even a tenth as many as he flirted with, and smoked half as much at home as he did everywhere else, then Fenris would not wish living with him upon anyone.

However, now they were on the subject of freedom, and Bethany was frowning at him. "The Alienage isn't exactly a _nice_ place, you know," she admonished.

"But they do have freedom. And they are also safe in the knowledge that they are not a constant danger to others as a rule." Fenris leaned back in his seat. "It is a poor comparison to both slaves and mages."

"Freedom to do what, though? Nothing, really. Not without being judged. It's the same with mages, there." She folded her arms atop the back of the chair so that she might rest her head on them. The chair creaked, but she was slight enough that it wasn't about to break under her weight. "Though, sometimes... Sometimes I wonder if it wouldn't be _better_ if I didn't have to be afraid of being caught by the blasted Templars all the time," she murmured, half to herself.

"Templars exist to protect mages from themselves as much as they exist to protect others from mages," he reminded her.

Bethany gave him a bland look. "I'm not _that_ thick. I know all that already." She sagged against the chair. "I just... I wonder sometimes if maybe it wouldn't be better if I _were_ in the Circle. So I wouldn't have to run anymore."

Fenris eyed her with a slight furrowing of his brows. "...Your brother would not approve."

A bubbling giggle escaped her. "He doesn't approve of a lot of things." Then she smiled, sweet and kind as ever. "All the same, we'd best not tell him about that, yeah?"

He did not say what he was thinking, that Bethany hardly need be worried about turning into an abomination. That she was far from being a danger, and that he would rather not see such a songbird caged. Those thoughts were treacherous indeed, and far from what she needed to hear. "It would be unwise to do so, I agree," he said instead.

She was obviously getting tired, so Fenris let her have his bed to sleep in. She declined at first, but after he steadfastly refused to let her go home alone at such a late hour, she reluctantly agreed to it. As it turned out, the reluctance was largely feigned for the sake of politeness, because she hardly _restrained_ herself from flopping on the overlarge bed and burrowing into the covers as soon as it was established that she was allowed to do so.

Though it didn't seem like she would be awake for very long after that, as Fenris began to leave the room, he heard her shift under the sheets and turned to see her peeking out at him with those warm, gentle brown eyes.

She yawned, covering her mouth to do so. "Fenris?" she asked sleepily.

"I am here," he assured her.

"If I turned into an abomination or did blood magic, you'd stop me, right?"

He froze. It took him a moment to process that question, because in his mind he'd managed to separate Bethany entirely from the category of mages that magisters and other maleficarum were in. As such, the mental image that her question conjured up made his mind recoil in disgust.

When no answer immediately came, she went on to say, "--'cos I always had Carver before, and he agreed to it, but I don't think Jeb _could_ , so..."

 _So you ask it of me instead?_ Fenris swallowed heavily, but lifted his head so that she might see him and be reassured. He did not have confidence in his own willingness to do such a thing, but she needed to see that he did, so that was what he would show her. "I would," he said.

She let out a heavy sigh of relief. "Thanks." She nestled herself deeper under the covers, pulling them most of the way over her head. Then as an afterthought, "...G'night, Fenris."

He bowed his head in aknowledgement. "Goodnight," he replied. After that, he left her to sleep.

Even after retreating downstairs, it took another bottle of wine for him to finally be able to sleep, himself.

 


End file.
